Firstly, just a little update on my life, today we had our exam results day. I got mine and I passed fair and square! Maybe not exactly the results I wanted but this is only year 12, I still have year 13 to improve! Anyway me and my friend planned to get some friends together and go to YO!Sushi in Leeds to celebrate, but since we all wished our grades were a little higher it turned into a comfort food session. XD

I got my friend to take a few pictures of us at YO!Sushi so you could see what the place is like. Here’s a few snaps:

Here was my first dish. God I love this, I think it’s the Beef&Garlic Teriyaki which is slices of premium beef glazed in garlic teriyaki sauce. I didn’t actually know it contained garlic until I looked at the online menu (to which I’ll post a link at the bottom of this post) but that’s probably what made the glaze on the beef so damn tasty! It’s served with little red chilli pepper slices (not hot at all from what I can remember), spring onions (I think) and a slice of lime that some people squeeze over the meal but I just sucked it…and then convulsed…ahh so sour. But OISHII! 🙂

I also had two other dishes; one was two large piece of sushi rolls and the other was a dessert called Doryaki which was just small little quarter pancakes with a bit of custard filling served with a raspberry sauce pot. 🙂

I also bought a green tea (free refills) for £1.15 (NOT BAD AT ALLLLL!) and then I just had to buy a glass of coke because I needed something cold. 🙂

*our table during the time we were there, got more cramped as the hour went on haha!*

These are just snaps of the little food conveyor belt. So easy to just pluck your food off and eat it nyaha! This is why I love YO!Sushi!

First photo here is of the cover of the YO!Sushi menu you’re given when you eat at the restaurant and the second one is the first page which shows you the different sections of the menu. It’s easy to manoeuvre around and explains everything very simply and easily. Cute! 🙂

Aaaaaand this is us after we’d eaten, clearly a happy bunch o’ squirrels hehee. That’s me doing the peace sign! *Asian style of course, how can you NOT at YO!Sushi?*

The food was amazing, not expensive whatsoever but extremely filling! The Beef&Garlic Teryaki filled me up really well, I almost thought I couldn’t eat anymore! Had to though, all too good, teehee. If you’re ever in YO!Sushi comment here and tell what you think! I’d love to hear your opinions on my favourite Japanese restaurant. I have yet to go to WAGAMAMA…shhhh…

I’ve always been curious about eating live seafood like octopus and squid, how do you eat it? What does it taste like? Is it freaky? So I asked my friends from Korea and Japan about eating live seafood and they told me quite a bit actually. Some replies were online so I have had to edit the text a little and some I received in person. All of them have tried live seafood at least once in their life, this is what they told me!

I talked to my friend Yui from Japan about seafood and she asked me if I’d eaten octopus (cooked) before. I said I hadn’t and that it looked a bit scary and she said it’s good but it “only looks bad!” She said there’s also たこのおどりぐい (Tako no odori gui) which means literally ‘octopus that’s dancing food’ and that there are few people who challenge themselves to eat it. I asked her to elaborate on eating live seafood a bit more and she explained to me (in Japanese).

“There are mainly living octopus and squid/cuttlefish, shrimp/prawn/lobster etc and the these things you eat are called odorigui, dancing food! Say, octopus, you eat it’s leg in thin broiled seaweed in case it starts shaking. When I eat the moving octopus it sticks to my mouth.”

Another Japanese friend of mine, who will go by the name Rice, explained that he had eaten live seafood but couldn’t remember in detail as he was very young. He did explain that “we call that odorigui. Odori means dance and gui means food so food dances in your mouth when you are eating it!”

I asked my friend from Korea, Jungwon, what she thought of eating live seafood and she said: “OH YEAH! It is delicious when we eat that with 초장(Chojang).”

Chojang is a special sweet and spicy red-chilli pepper sauce.

“I didnt like it when I was young, but maybe I am being old…hahaha. It just feels somewhat good when we are chewing that. And I use many sauce so I can feel just sauce!! But finally, it is delicious *.*”

Finally, my other friend from Korea, J.W, elaborated nicely after I asked him if he’s eaten live seafood before. “Yes I’ve eaten a live piece of small octopus. I’m not that into it though.” How does it taste? “Well it doesn’t taste bad because you have it with some sesame oil that has some salt in it so it tastes aromatic. You have it on a plate, yes it’s hard to chew but they
are served to be cut into small pieces so that you can eat them smoothly.”

Here I got a little confuzzled because he said it’s cut into small pieces and so I assumed after it’s been cut up it would be dead. Apparently not.

“Ahhhh it’s still alive but you know what? It means fresh, and when you chew in your mouth its almost gone. You don’t have to worry about it at all lol just very small pieces you’d swallow.”

Are there lots of places to eat live seafood in Korea?

“Yeah there are some but not everywhere on the street lol eating live octopus is somewhat common here but it doesn’t mean we love it. On the other hand there are also some koreans who cant handle it.”

Nice.

So I guess summarised, in Japan it’s slightly less common to eat moving seafood than it is in Korea, but that does not mean it’s rare, good GOD no. Both countries have different styles of serving and eating and I suppose Korea is more on the hot and spicy side of the sauce than the cool seaweed in Japan. But who knows! It’s not like I’ve interviewed the whole population, in fact I probably could have done with a few more opinions, so this is not a generalized summary it’s just based on my friends experiences. If I hear of any more from other friends I will add it to this post and share it in an update. 🙂 Later guys!

(You can find tons of videos of people eating live seafood on youtube so check it out!)

The times I’ve dragged my friends to YO!sushi and heard the same excuses. ‘I don’t wanna go because I hate sushi!’ ‘NO, I can’t eat raw fish it’s…ewargh.’

Just no.

Tons and tons and tons of people won’t go to Japanese restaurants because they’re scared of eating sushi or they say they don’t like it. The fact is about 90% of these people don’t actually know what sushi is. Not really.

What do you think sushi is? Raw fish? Like salmon wrapped in seaweed with a bit of rice?Sushi is often misunderstood as just raw fish but it’s actually rice with vinegar. The su- part means vinegar.

Now that’s cleared up, how about some facts about sushi?

Sushi is very popular in Japan and thus the sushi making business is extremely competitive with many restaurants personalizing their own secret methods of making the vinegared rice which they’ll share with no-one.

A lot of businesses make their sushi more attractive by shaping it into animals or characters from manga series’ and some even do personal sushi shapings.

It can actually take up to 10 years to qualify as a professional sushi chef.

Today’s sushi actually began as a type of fast food in the 19th century!

The classic sushi is an oval of rice which has been formed in the hand and is topped with things SUCH AS raw fish, cooked seafood, eggs, other vegetables.

Now you know a bit more about sushi get dowwwn to a Japanese restaurant and EAT.THEIR.FOOD. The worst thing I’ve ever heard one of my friends assume is that the only thing Japanese restaurants serve is sushi of which she hadn’t actually tried!

Japanese food consists of more than just sushi! There are plenty of meat dishes and vegetables and gorgeous desserts (sweet and savoury)! Don’t be put off by raw fish, you don’t need to go anywhere near it if you don’t want to so get dowwwwwwn there!

I may do a post on my experiences at YO!sushi at some point! ;D It’s 10pm now so night guys! Oyasuminasai!